iPhone 12 and 12 Pro review: Simply outstanding By CNET

Welcome I have an iPhone 12 and 12 pro. They both offer a slew of improvements and refinement over the 11 and 11 pro like 5v new cameras and new designs. So let's do this review every few years, there's a new generation of iPhone. Obviously there was the original one back in 2007 the iPhone 4 in 2010, the iPhone 6 in 2014, the iPhone 10 in 2017 and now in 2020, the iPhone 12. What marks these generational changes is largely a new hardware design that will be refined on future iPhones for the next three or four years, and one of the first things I noticed about the iPhone 12 is its globular beauty yeah. I know globular isn't a word, but apple's idea of premium differs from the flash and spectacle we see in premium.

Android phones, body, colors, don't seemingly morph from one to another, depending on the light. There isn't a screen that wraps around the edge. In fact, the iPhone 12 doesn't have any curved edges at all. Instead, a straight edged metal band defines the iPhone 12 much in the same way it did for the iPhone 4 5 and SE. Just uh without the chambered edges and it's the lack of frills that gives the iPhone 12 a bold, striking.

Look when I pick the 12 up, it feels more solid than any iPhone I've ever held and the build and finish especially on the 12 pro are simply extraordinary. That metal band is also a visible indication of another feature that marks a generational change 5g and that's because the band houses, multiple 5g antennas- and these are the first iPhones to support a 5g connection, there's even a cutout for one of the millimeter wave antennas on the side. The iPhone 12 is also defined by a stunning OLED panel, which apple calls super Dr display gone, is the LCD found on the 10r and 11 and what makes this screen pop. Besides, the contrast and resolution are the significantly thinner bezels around it. The cameras are outstanding.

Having received hardware, software and processing updates the iPhone 12 and 12 pro have the best overall camera systems on any phone. You can buy they're capable of capturing excellent photos, recording excellent video and delivering consistently fantastic images in a range of different environments and lighting, but the iPhone 12 is not without complexity. The iPhone, 12 and 12 pro are ridiculously similar. They both have the same size. They both have the same design, the same display the same a14 bionic chip, the same 5g support the same selfie wide and ultra-wide cameras' heck.

Furthermore, they both come in blue, okay, the 12 pro is technically pacific blue, but the reason to upgrade from the 12 to the 12 pro is not as clear as the black and white boxes. The phones come in might indicate the 12's higher price tag doesn't distinguish it as a value buy as much as the 11 did last year. Now, during my time with both phones, I found myself picking up the 12 pro more, not because it had a telephoto camera or LIDAR which allows it to take night mode portraits. I picked it up more because of the matte textured back the shiny, stainless steel band around the sides, the fact that the phone, despite weighing nearly an ounce more than the 12 aka 25 grams, that the phone feels solid and premium, and I think that the pro name should actually be called premium. The iPhone 12 premium, because it reflects more closely what the 12 pro truly is.

Now there are many people who would just get the iPhone 12 because it doesn't cost a thousand dollars, and it's a great phone which it is, and there are many people who will get the iPhone 12 Pro because it is more premium which it is. But there are some of you who might be trying to pick between the two phones and that's when we need to talk about dollars and storage, the iPhone 12 cost eight hundred and twenty-nine dollars. That's a hundred and thirty dollars more than last year's iPhone 11. Now, if you activate the 12 on a carrier, when you buy it, then you save thirty dollars, and it costs seven hundred and ninety-nine dollars, but that's still a hundred dollars. More than the 11, which you could make an argument that the 12 is worth that price increase and I guess it kind of is.

But when you compare the 12 to the 12 pro, you need to consider that the 12 comes with 64 gigabytes of storage, while the 12 pro comes with 128 and an iPhone 12 with 128 gigabytes of storage cost 879. Unless you activate it and get the 30 discount thing, but get this the iPhone 12 Pro starts at 999, whether you activate it on a carrier. So really there's a 120 difference between the 12 and the 12 pro with the same amount of storage, and when you consider that it makes much more sense that both of these phones are so similar, because there's not that huge of a difference in price features or value like there was between last year's iPhone, 11 and 11. Pro. Look, I'm done talking about dollars and storage.

So let's talk about 5g, it's brilliant that both the iPhone 12 and 12 pro support, sub six and millimeter wave 5g here in the US. One phone doesn't have better support for 5g than the other. They are the same. Now I tested both of these phones, while in Greenville South Carolina on both T-Mobile's 5g network and Verizon's nationwide 5g the non-millimeter wave version. Now that said, I was impressed by the coverage both networks had, but not always with the consistency of speeds.

I got between 10.4 and 14.9 megabits per second downloads on T-Mobile and 97.9 and 104 megabits download speeds on Verizon, but that's where I am right now. I was recently in Chicago testing, android phones there, and I got a 110 megabits per second download speeds on T-Mobile, so your mileage with 5g is definitely going to vary during Apple's event. They mentioned that the iPhone 12 family supports the most 5g bands on any phone which bodes well if you hold on to your iPhone's three, four or five years, but there isn't that killer app or that amazing service. Yet that really shows off how 5g is pushing things forward right now, you're going to see a lot of reviews showing you speed, test scores and how fast you can download the third season of the marvelous, Mrs Maisey, on Amazon. You know actually, okay, there is one cool thing um with 5g that I was able to do on this phone and that was had a HD FaceTime call over cellular.

So yeah, that's nice. More of that please connect to 5g can tax your phone's battery. So one of the clever features apple implemented in terms of software is called smart data which balances your needs for data speed and power. Smart data looks at a number of factors to determine if 5g is needed. Like is your screen on or are you playing music? It also looks at network traffic and, if using 5g, isn't needed, it'll automatically switch you to a 4g connection.

Smart data can even switch between different bands of 5g that your carrier offers, which I think is really cool, especially as 5g networks grow down the line and if you want, you can override smart data and select a high 5g connectivity all the time. It's really up to you, but let's switch from 5g and talk about the cameras. The iPhone 12 has the exact same cameras as the iPhone 12 Pro except the iPhone 12 Pro has a telephoto camera and LIDAR more on that in a moment, but the phones aren't just dependent on hardware to take good photos and videos. Apple's new a14 bionic chip, along with software and machine learning, allows for improvements to well pretty much everything. For example, the 12 and 12 pro have the same hardware for their ultra-wide angle, camera as last year's 11 and 11 pro, but the 12 and 12 pro have software to correct the lens distortion.

Now take a look at these ultra-wide angle: photos of a brick wall. Here it is taken with the 11, and here it is taken with the iPhone 12 Pro now. That's quite a difference. The main wide angle camera on both phones has a faster lens that lets in more light. The new lens combined with smart hdr3 yields, truly amazing photos with accurate, colors and solid dynamic range night mode is now on the ultra-wide angle and selfie camera.

I'm shocked at how good some night mode photos came out. Even selfie portraits that I took the aforementioned telephoto camera on the 12. Pro is a huge step up in zoom compared to the 12. , but there are a number of phones that offer much longer zooms with better results in terms of video, especially on the iPhone 12 Pro. The focus is fantastic and was able to track me even when I was shooting at night and that's because of the LIDAR sensor.

In fact, some clips in this review video were shot on the iPhone 12 Pro. Let's move on from cameras and talk about performance, the new a14 bionic chip, which is also used in the iPad Air powers both of these phones and to be honest, it's kind of hard to see the difference in speed over the 813 chip, which is still very fast and very peppy. The a14 chip is as much about power right now as it is about future proofing, your phone, so it can handle iOS 17 in a few years, but I did run performance benchmark tests on the new phones and both the iPhone 12 and 12 pro recorded. The highest scores of any phones, CNET has ever tested playing games was fast and fun AR apps were lively and never stuttered. In terms of battery life.

I got through a day and the next morning. For the most part, though, I want more time to really take a look at battery life, especially when I'm not spending every second testing photographing and reviewing these phones. Now I was able to run a single battery test with a looped video playing at 50, brightness and airplane mode, and the iPhone 12 Pro lasted 15 hours and 56 minutes, while the 12 lasted 17 hours in 14 minutes now, obviously, we have to run more tests on the 12 and 12 pro so check back to my review article on CNET for updates, but so far pretty good in terms of charging. The phone comes with an USB c to lightning cable, which can offer some superfast speeds. If you haven't heard by now, Apple is no longer, including a pair of wired AirPods in the box or a power adapter, and then there's MagSafe, which uses magnets in the phone to help position it more.

Ideally on the new MagSafe wireless charger that you can buy the idea is it will charge your phone more efficiently. Also, I tried out some MagSafe cases which work really well and allow for wireless charging through the case without the loss of power, but these magnets also allow for this detachable wallet with or without a case which I never thought I was a wallet guy, but this won me over. I'm excited by the idea of MagSafe. I'm excited to see what apple and third-party companies use it for, but last, let's talk about durability and there's a lot to talk about here. Both phones have a new material that covers the screen called ceramic shield.

It starts off as glass, and then it gets infused with NATO ceramic crystals. Now, when this happens, it's no longer considered glass and apple claims. It offers four times the protection. When this drops, I'm not sure exactly what that means, and I don't know how you test for that. But I do know my colleagues will be putting the 12 and 12 pro through a series of drop tests, as well as water tests to see if apple's claims hold up now.

The iPhone, 12 and 12 pro are both rated for ip68 water and dust resistance and can withstand being submerged in water up to a depth of 6 meters. In the time I had the phones, it handled spills, just fine, some rain, just fine and being submerged in water, just fine to wrap things up here. The iPhone, 12 and 12 pro are amazing phones, but we only have half the picture right now, because there is also the iPhone 12 mini which I'm particularly excited about because of its petite size and value proposition, and there's the iPhone 12 Pro max, which, on paper maxes out the size of the phone's display and offers camera improvements that none of the other iPhones 12 have. So that's all I got, but I want to hear from you would do you think of the iPhone 12 and 12 pro? Is there one you'd pick over the other? Is there one you're planning on buying? And if so, how would you choose between these two throw your thoughts in the comments.

Source : CNET